Buying a flagship IEM usually means accepting somebody else’s idea of what $4,000 worth of “perfect” should sound like. Want a little more bass or less treble afterward? Welcome to EQ, tip rolling, cable swapping, and the kind of late-night Head-Fi behavior that makes normal people question our priorities.

64 Audio’s new Ocean takes a different approach. The $3,999 universal-fit flagship combines six drivers, dual isobaric dynamic woofers, the company’s tia and apex technologies, and a new Passive Acoustic Control system that offers as many as 32 acoustic configurations without DSP or electronic EQ.

Ocean will be available to audition at CanJam SoCal 2026, August 29–30 at the Irvine Marriott.

Who Is 64 Audio?

Founded by Vitaliy Belonozhko, 64 Audio began life as 1964 Ears and grew from a family-run custom-monitor business into one of the more influential American IEM manufacturers.

Products including the U12t, Nio, Fourté, and A12t helped build the brand, but its real calling card has been proprietary technology. tia removes conventional acoustic tubing from portions of the driver path, apex manages pneumatic pressure inside the ear canal, and LID is designed to minimize frequency-response changes caused by different source impedances.

The Fourté, introduced during 64 Audio’s original tia push in 2016, has remained one of its best-known flagships. Ocean now sits above it in the universal lineup.

Six Drivers, But That Is Not the Main Story

Ocean uses a 6-driver, 4-way architecture:

• Two cone-to-cone isobaric dynamic drivers for bass
• Two balanced-armature midrange drivers
• One balanced-armature high-mid driver
• One tia high-frequency driver

64 Audio specifies a 5Hz-22kHz frequency response, 9.5-ohm impedance, and 103.7dB/mW sensitivity.

The dual dynamic woofers operate in a cone-to-cone isobaric configuration, which 64 Audio says provides powerful low-frequency output while maintaining control and reducing unwanted distortion.

Driver count alone, however, stopped being especially meaningful somewhere around the time manufacturers began treating IEM shells like Manhattan studio apartments.

What makes Ocean more interesting is what surrounds those drivers.

Passive Acoustic Control

64 Audio’s new Passive Acoustic Control system lets users physically change several aspects of the IEM’s acoustic behavior.

Two interchangeable tia screens adjust high-frequency damping. Four rear vent filters alter the pneumatic loading of the isobaric bass drivers. Four interchangeable apex modules — mX, m12, m15, and m20 — change isolation and pressure relief.

Taken together, those components create up to 32 possible combinations.

Ocean is not magically 32 completely different IEMs, but the system gives owners considerably more control over bass response, upper-frequency energy, isolation, and pressure without depending on an app or digital processing.

For a $3,999 IEM, that flexibility makes considerably more sense than being locked into one tuning and hoping your ears agree with the engineer who designed it.

Design and Accessories

Ocean uses a T6061 aluminum shell with a machined faceplate finished in Champagne Copper. Its pattern is inspired by aeolian ripples formed when wind moves across sand.

Compared with some flagship IEMs covered in gemstones, exotic woods, and enough decorative metal to furnish a casino lobby, the Ocean looks relatively restrained.

It uses standard 0.78mm two-pin connectors and ships with both 3.5mm and 4.4mm balanced cables constructed from silver-plated UP-OCC copper.

The package also includes TrueFidelity foam tips, SpinFit silicone tips, standard silicone tips, a carrying case, cleaning accessories, and all four apex modules.

Specifications

• Model: 64 Audio Ocean
• Type: Universal-fit IEM
• Drivers: 6, four-way architecture
• Bass: Dual isobaric dynamic drivers
• Midrange: 2 balanced-armature drivers
• High-Mid: 1 balanced-armature driver
• Treble: 1 tia driver
• Frequency Response: 5Hz–22kHz
• Impedance: 9.5 ohms at 1kHz
• Sensitivity: 103.7dB/mW at 1kHz
• Isolation: 10-20dB depending on apex module
• Connector: 0.78mm two-pin
• Included Cables: 3.5mm and 4.4mm balanced
• Finish: Champagne Copper

Competition

At $3,999, Ocean swims in very expensive water.

For a thousand dollars less, the UE Premiere feature 21 drivers per earpiece with a five-way crossover, and come in universal and custom fit options.

The Noble Audio Kronos at $4,500 combines dual dynamic woofers with balanced-armature and electrostatic drivers, putting it squarely in the same ultra-premium category.

Ocean also competes with 64 Audio’s own products.

The Astell&Kern x 64 Audio XIO costs $3,000 and uses ten drivers, while the long-running Fourté remains available for $3,599. Anyone already considering either model will need to decide whether Ocean’s adjustable acoustic system is worth moving further up the ladder.

And that is really the point: at this level, counting drivers is pointless. The meaningful difference is what a manufacturer does with them.

The Bottom Line

The 64 Audio Ocean is entering a flagship IEM market where $3,000-plus products have become surprisingly common and manufacturers need more than extravagant materials and large driver counts to stand out.

Ocean’s dual isobaric bass system, tia architecture, apex modules, and LID technology give it serious technical credentials, but Passive Acoustic Control is its most distinctive feature. Being able to tailor the physical acoustic system without DSP gives buyers unusual flexibility at a price where flexibility should probably be expected.

Whether Ocean actually sounds better than the Fourté, XIO, FiR Redux 6, or Noble Viking Prestige will require listening rather than counting acronyms.

Fortunately, CanJam SoCal begins this weekend.

For more information: 64audio.com

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Flipboard has acquired Graze, a Portland startup that lets creators build, tune and monetise custom social feeds without writing code, mainly on Bluesky. Graze says it has delivered more than 41 billion posts to 12 million users since forming 21 months ago.

Flipboard has bought the plumbing for custom social feeds. The company is acquiring Graze, a Portland startup that lets creators and publishers build, tune and monetise their own algorithms without writing code.

The numbers are striking for the size of the team. Graze says it has delivered more than 41 billion posts to 12 million users in the 21 months since it formed, most of that on the newly funded Bluesky.

The team is two people. Co-founder Devin Gaffney and engineer Nick Gerakines both move to Flipboard, after two of the three original founders left last year, and financial terms were not disclosed.

The money behind it was modest. Graze raised a $1mn pre-seed in April 2025 led by Betaworks, with Salesforce Ventures Factorial, Apertu Capital and Skyseed alongside angels from Mozilla and Protocol Labs.

Flipboard has been building toward this for a while. Under chief executive Mike McCue it has invested in AT Protocol, ActivityPub and RSS, and launched Surf, a browser for the open social web.

Gaffney describes the fit as mechanical. “Surf will be the browser for the open social web,” he wrote, while “Graze will be the engine under those feeds.”

His argument is about who curates. As generative AI clogs the legacy platforms, he says a curatorial role in shaping the algorithm is the only sustainable way to run an attention economy.

Europeans already have a thin version of this by law. Article 38 of the Digital Services Act requires very large online platforms to offer at least one recommender option not based on profiling.

The difference is what each is for. The regulation guarantees a way to turn the algorithm off, while Graze exists to let someone build a better one and charge for it.

The open social web’s centre of gravity is partly European in any case. Mastodon is German, moved to a non-profit structure and has kept adding ways for people to follow creators without an account.

What happens next is a business question rather than a protocol one. Two people built a feed engine at that scale on a million dollars, and somebody now has to prove that curating attention pays better than harvesting it.

The biggest threat to any crewed expedition to Mars is time. NASA’s shortest blueprint for sending people to the Red Planet and back requires spending 620 days in space and 30 days on Mars. Even setting aside the compounding challenges of building life-support systems that can operate without resupply for that long, or the fact that longer journeys leave more time for unlucky accidents, life in microgravity and solar and cosmic radiation will inexorably exact their cumulative toll on human bodies.

We want to make it possible to dramatically reduce the length of time crews must spend in space—down to just 335 days in transit or less. This will both simplify many engineering challenges and keep astronauts healthier and safer. We believe the key to this time reduction is a new approach to building a holy grail of space exploration, the bimodal nuclear rocket.

In the 1960s, U.S. open-air ground tests demonstrated much of the technology needed for nuclear thermal rockets as part of the NERVA and Rover projects.Nevada State Museum, Las Vegas

Technicians at NASA’s Lewis Research Center test a nozzle design for a nuclear thermal rocket in 1965. GRC/NASA

The prototype SNAP-10A, orbited in 1965, is to date still the only nuclear reactor launched into space by the United States. George Rinhart/Corbis/Getty Images

We are Kurt Polzin, chief engineer of NASA’s space nuclear propulsion project at the Marshall Space Flight Center, with over two decades of experience in advanced propulsion research, and Robert Schleicher, chief engineer for nuclear technologies and materials at General Atomics. And to explain just what a bimodal nuclear rocket is, and why the new version we have conceived together brings it closer to future reality, we first need to take a quick trip to the past.

As early as 1946, researchers realized that nuclear reactors had the potential to become extremely efficient thermal rocket engines. Most rockets are thermal rockets, and they work by expelling hot gases through a nozzle, thrusting the rocket forward. While there are other factors such as nozzle shape, generally speaking, the hotter and faster you make the rocket’s exhaust gases, the more acceleration the rocket will produce for a given mass of propellant. Because a smaller molecule will move faster than a larger one when heated to a given temperature, the smaller the molecular mass of your propellants, the better. By convention, the efficiency of a rocket engine is measured by how long the engine can exert a thrust equal to the initial weight of its propellant, a quantity known as specific impulse.

In a conventional thermal rocket, such as those used in every launch to orbit since Sputnik, the exhaust temperature and speed—and thus the specific impulse—is dictated by the energy released by a chemical reaction and the mass of the reaction’s by-product. The most efficient chemical rockets today combust hydrogen with oxygen, producing water and a specific impulse that tops out around 450 seconds.

But a nuclear rocket is not limited by chemistry. The heart of a nuclear thermal rocket is a nuclear fission reactor, in which chain reactions in uranium fuel release much more energy per kilogram than is possible with chemical combustion. A turbopump forces liquid hydrogen alone—with its very small molecular mass—through the reactor’s core, heating it to temperatures of at least 2,700 kelvin before expelling it, resulting in a specific impulse of 900 seconds or more.

In the 1950s and 1960s, the Rover and NERVA (Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Applications) programs ­ground-tested nuclear thermal rockets. By the early 1970s, the technology had matured to the point where flight tests were being planned. But changing political and budgetary winds led to nuclear thermal development being shut down in 1973.

Another prong of nuclear propulsion that has also demonstrated considerable promise is nuclear electric propulsion. In electric propulsion, instead of creating a stream of hot rocket exhaust through chemical reactions or exposure to the core of a nuclear reactor, electricity is generated and used to create electromagnetic fields that accelerate an ionized propellant such as xenon or lithium.

Various schemes to do this exist, including some that have already seen considerable time in space, such as the ion thrusters used on the Dawn asteroid mission launched in 2007. So far, these electric thrusters have only been powered by solar panels. But with a nuclear reactor as part of a power plant that supplies the juice, more thrust could be produced. And moving beyond solar power is particularly important in missions to the outer solar system where sparse solar photons would require enormous solar arrays.

With electric thrusters, specific impulses in the range of 2,200 to 4,600 seconds are possible, but currently with very low thrust. With the energy available to a nuclear-powered electric ­propulsion engine, you could have greater acceleration and reduced mission times. The nuclear reactor could also provide electrical power for all the spacecraft systems as well.

The System for Nuclear Auxiliary Power (SNAP) program launched the SNAP-10A in 1965 as a proof of concept, the first—and so far only—U.S. nuclear power reactor in space. It generated about 600 watts of electrical power for 43 days before shutdown and is still in orbit. Subsequent U.S. initiatives for more substantive electric power and nuclear thermal propulsion systems, such as the SP-100, Project Timberwind, and Project Prometheus, along with more recent projects like Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations (DRACO) and Joint Emergent Technology Supplying On-Orbit Nuclear (JETSON), have emerged sporadically over the years. None of these have yet progressed to actual flight.

However, space nuclear power got a huge shot in the arm in March 2026 when NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman announced a new space exploration initiative. As part of that initiative, the agency plans to launch Space Reactor-1 Freedom (SR-1) to deliver a trio of robot-survey helicopters to Mars. Driven by nuclear electric propulsion, SR-1 aims to demonstrate fission technology in deep space and would be the first nuclear-powered interplanetary spacecraft, generating 20 kilowatts of electric power aboard.

This is a bold step for NASA, and brings us up to the present, but the details of the proposed mission also highlight a familiar limitation of nuclear electric propulsion. Even with improved acceleration, electric propulsion still cannot generate the powerful bursts of thrust needed to escape gravity wells, such as those of Earth or Mars, or perform time-critical maneuvers, like course corrections. On the other hand, while not as efficient and unable to supply electrical power for spacecraft systems, nuclear thermal engines are great at delivering high thrust at critical moments.

What is a bimodal nuclear rocket?

Some engineers would suggest we build two separate systems—one reactor for thermal propulsion and another reactor for power and electric propulsion. But since at least the 1990s, it has been the dream of many engineers to combine nuclear thermal and nuclear electric in one package, with one reactor: the bimodal nuclear rocket.

Most previous bimodal proposals depend on complex valve arrangements to integrate the propulsion and power systems. In thermal propulsion mode, the reactor is brought to maximum activity by a set of control drums that ring the core, which is composed of a matrix of long uranium-fuel elements. The drums take the shape of long cylinders made of beryllium, with a 120-degree segment of each cylinder covered with boron carbide. Boron absorbs neutrons, and when that segment faces the reactor, the reactor’s activity is low as neutrons escaping from the core are captured. Rotating the boron segment so that it faces away from the core (leaving only the beryllium exposed) increases nuclear activity as the beryllium reflects escaping neutrons back into the core’s fuel elements, where they can contribute to chain reactions.

This proposed trajectory, developed at NASA’s Glenn Research Center, shows where high-thrust maneuvers [blue dots] are executed by a nuclear thermal engine and additional low-thrust, high-efficiency acceleration and deceleration is performed by electric propulsion [hashed lines show thrust direction].NASA Glenn Research Center

Once the reactor is generating large amounts of heat, liquid hydrogen is pumped through channels that run the length of the core. Turned into an expanding hot gas, the hydrogen blasts from the other end of the core to form the rocket’s powerful exhaust.

In nuclear power mode, the reactor’s activity is damped. Valves seal the channels and a so-called power-conversion fluid—typically a mixture of helium and xenon gas—circulates through the reactor in a closed loop. The reactor is still hot enough to warm this fluid, which drives a turbine connected to an electrical generator.

The key point here is that a single set of flow channels and nuclear-fuel elements are used for both modes. But the valves used to switch modes face the formidable challenge of enduring months, or even years, in a harsh radiation environment while maintaining leak-tight performance.

The core’s activity is controlled by the rotating drums surrounding it. Within the core, low-temperature fuel elements [left in blue, and top right] produce electric power by heating a circulating fluid. High-temperature fuel elements [left in red, and bottom right] heat hydrogen as a propellant. (The taper of the HTFE’s exhaust channel is exaggerated for illustrative purposes. Ways of packaging the HTFE’s uranium fuel other than with particles are possible.)John MacNeill

In addition, the nuclear-fuel elements surrounding the channels must be able to operate for short durations at very high temperatures during thermal thrust maneuvers and for long durations at lower temperatures during the rest of the voyage. It is difficult to build one type of element capable of both. Hence, the complexity and demanding engineering requirements of previous bimodal designs has hindered their practical application.

We propose a simplified approach, a hybrid system we call the synchronal bimodal nuclear rocket (S-BNR). The genesis for this design came about when we were attending a conference together in 2025. One of us (Polzin) had an initial idea, and in time-honored tradition, he sketched it out on a napkin to see if the other (Schleicher) thought there was actually a way to do it. We’ve been working on refining the concept ever since.

How the synchronal bimodal nuclear rocket works

Rather than relying on a complex valve system, the S-BNR uses two hydraulically independent loops within a single reactor core, one open loop (for thermal propulsion) and one closed loop (for electrical power). The core is divided into two zones, one per loop, differentiated by the type of fuel elements in each. Several designs for the fuel elements are possible: In our preliminary design, the high-temperature fuel elements (HTFEs) in the thermal propulsion zone consist of a bed of “pebbles”—uranium fuel encased in zirconium carbide—that surround a central tapering channel and operate at greater than 2,700 K. (One possible alternative for the HTFEs would be a solid fuel design, as with NERVA.) The hydrogen propellant passes through the pebble bed, where the pebbles’ large surface area maximizes the transfer of heat needed for efficient high-thrust propulsion.

The other zone has low-temperature fuel elements (LTFEs), optimized for long-term, efficient production of electricity, which can range from tens of kilowatts to several megawatts. In these elements, the uranium fuel in solid form surrounds a double-walled channel: The power-conversion fluid is pumped down the inside and returns along the outside wall, absorbing heat from the fuel and operating at moderate temperatures (at or above 1,200 K).

The electric-power and nuclear-thrust elements of the core have separate fluid loops, which eliminates the need for valves to switch between closed-loop operation for power generation and open-loop operation for propulsion.John MacNeill

Both the HTFEs and LTFEs contribute the neutrons required to sustain chain reactions. In power-only mode, residual heat moves from the HTFEs into adjoining LTFEs. The physical interface between the elements is designed to moderate this thermal flow to balance two competing needs: It must allow enough heat flow to safely remove the residual heat from the HTFEs, but it must also limit that heat flow so the LTFEs’ temperatures do not go past their allowable limits when the HTFEs operate at high power.

During combined propulsion and power operation, a heat exchanger on the power loop preheats the hydrogen propellant for the thrust loop, aiding the turbopump that feeds the hydrogen through the core. After a propulsion burn is completed and the HTFE chain reactions are damped by the control elements, the power loop removes residual-decay heat coming from the HTFEs as described above, eliminating the requirement in earlier designs for additional propellant flow just to cool down the core while on standby. This dual-loop system also means the engine can produce high thrust whenever needed while allowing the generator to remain active at all times—a significant advantage for crewed missions.

By adopting this dual-loop architecture, the S-BNR removes the need for the problematic mode-switching valves found in earlier concepts. Each fission zone is constructed with materials tailored to its specific temperature and power requirements, ensuring optimal performance and durability. The result is uninterrupted electrical power across all mission stages, making it unnecessary to carry additional liquid hydrogen just to manage decay heat.

The challenges ahead

While significant progress in developing the design of the S-BNR has been made, substantial challenges remain. The reactor must maintain stable control across a wide power range, from modest levels for electricity generation to hundreds of megawatts of thermal power during high-thrust operation. Operating the ­power-generation loop in close proximity to the HTFEs requires very careful management of both temperature and the neutrons emitted by the fuel elements.

And crucially, demonstrating reliable, long-duration performance is particularly demanding: Missions to Mars may require years of continuous power generation. ­Outer-planet probes equipped with S-BNR engines could extend that to a decade or longer.

In the past, nuclear thermal propulsion fuel elements were engineered for extremely high temperatures but only brief operational lifetimes (typically hours), whereas proposed nuclear electric propulsion fuel elements are optimized for lower temperatures and intended to last for years. By using two different types of fuel elements in the S-BNR, we can take advantage of the design heritage of both these development tracks. Fortunately, recent NASA-sponsored research has produced several promising candidates that may meet these demanding requirements.

Ground-testing these systems is also a challenge. Early in the Rover and NERVA era, the exhaust from test engines was blasted into the atmosphere, something now unacceptable. Today, any ground test of an engine must completely capture all potentially radioactive exhaust products. Fortunately, a number of approaches have been developed to capture and scrub the exhaust, although these methods currently carry a significant price tag.

Then there is the ultimate test: flying an S-BNR in space. International regulatory and safety protocols for nuclear launches were developed largely in response to the Soviet Union’s launch of dozens of nuclear-powered Radar Ocean Reconnaissance Satellite (RORSAT) radar spy satellites in the 1970s and 1980s. There were a number of incidents, with the most serious leaving radioactive debris strewn across a swath of Canada in 1978. This history led to a consensus in the space community that might be summarized as “Thou shalt not bring a nuclear reactor to criticality in any Earth orbit that decays faster than dangerous isotopes.”

Thus any S-BNR would be launched atop a conventional chemical rocket, with a completely cold reactor and fresh fuel. Fresh uranium fuel is not in fact very radioactive: The potentially larger concern is the chemical toxicity of this heavy metal, but it can easily be handled by wearing light protective suits, respirators, and gloves. Only after the control elements have been adjusted to permit chain reactions to begin within the core are highly radioactive isotopes able to form from fission fragments. There would be even less cause for concern than when launching a radioisotope thermoelectric generator (RTG), such as the sort that are currently powering the Perseverance rover on Mars and the New Horizons mission in the outer solar system.

Even in the most extreme scenario imaginable—the chemical booster explodes and somehow damages the reactor’s control elements in just the right way to initiate a chain reaction—there wouldn’t be time to produce a large amount of toxic isotopes before the reactor broke apart and reactions ceased. (We can be sure of this because Project Rover actually tested this kind of worst-case scenario in 1965 with the Kiwi-TNT test, where an engine prototype was rigged to produce a runaway chain reaction sufficient to vaporize the reactor core due to the immense internal pressure buildup. Negligible radiation spread outside a radius of two miles (3.2 kilometers), well within the range of safe distances for launching any rocket capable of reaching orbit, and site decontamination was possible after only a few days of radioactive decay.)

Despite all these considerable engineering challenges, the foundation laid by decades of investment in nuclear thermal and electric propulsion and terrestrial nuclear power technologies provides a solid platform for continued advancement. Indeed, much of the foundational work is already underway through ongoing NASA and U.S. Space Force efforts.

The Dawn asteroid mission relied on electric thrusters, demonstrating their utility for long-duration spaceflight.JPL-Caltech/NASA

We envision the following action plan to merge these technology pathways: Modeling must be performed to demonstrate and verify strategies for thermal management and the control of nuclear processes over the full range of operating power levels. Near-term non-nuclear testing will validate fluid loop operation, heat transfer mechanisms, and control strategies. Next, component-level irradiation and thermal trials will qualify new materials. Then, integrated reactor testing will begin, first without nuclear fuel and later with fueled reactors undergoing fission. Finally, initial in-space demonstrations could begin with lower-power systems, eventually scaling up to full bimodal capabilities.

Achieving success will require close collaboration across NASA, the Department of Energy, the Department of Defense, industry partners, and the broader technical community. Progress will depend on advancements in ­high-temperature fuels and materials, improved systems for power conversion and heat transport, and the adoption of innovative manufacturing techniques and methods to control nuclear fission over a wide range of output power. In particular, integrated system testing will be more complex than previous programs such as NERVA, due to the combined functions and distinct operational regimes for thermal propulsion and power generation. We hope engineers and researchers with relevant expertise will be encouraged to contribute to addressing these challenges, whether in the areas of thermal management, reactor modeling and control, extended-duration testing, or safety analysis.

Past ground tests and limited demonstrations have already established the capabilities of space nuclear systems. With architectures like the synchronal bimodal nuclear rocket, the prospect of integrating high-thrust propulsion and sustained power generation becomes increasingly practical and versatile. The next phase is not simply about traveling fast. It’s about building crewed and uncrewed spacecraft that can reliably travel to destinations throughout the solar system that are currently difficult or impossible to reach, with missions potentially lasting years or even decades.

This article appears in the September 2026 print issue as “A Reimagined Nuclear Rocket.”

“Look, I’m not trying to do a conspiracy here,” wrote right-wing commentator Sydney Watson in an X post on Monday, before proceeding to implicitly endorse one.

The Australian YouTuber, who has more than a million followers on that platform, had shared a 2024 video of Brittney Griner, center for the WNBA’s Connecticut Sun, admiring a new basketball arena at Baylor University, where she was a legendary powerhouse NCAA player between 2009 and 2013. Watson speculated in her post that “maybe the reason the WNBA refuses to define ‘woman’ and definitively say that men can’t play in the league is because there is already a man … in the league.”

The baseless and inflammatory remark (Griner is a cisgender woman) came amid an ongoing moral panic about transgender women in sports, which has been ginned up by MAGA world and Donald Trump with help from a handful of female athletes. The most outspoken of these is Riley Gaines, a former collegiate swimmer for the University of Kentucky; she tied for fifth in a 2022 NCAA championship event with Lia Thomas, a transgender competitor, and soon rocketed to fame as an anti-transgender activist thanks to the grievance-industrial complex of the far right.

In the WNBA, Sophie Cunningham, a shooting guard and small forward for the Indiana Fever, has likewise begun to embrace a role as spokeswoman for this rancorous movement.

Cunningham made waves with a July ESPN profile that quoted her opposition to allowing trans women in leagues such as the WNBA, becoming an icon of transphobic fear-mongering overnight. She explained in the interview that she wanted to “protect young girls in a locker room, or young girls in sport who shouldn’t have to go against biological men.” In subsequent comments, Cunningham reaffirmed her stance: “I think it’s kind of common sense,” she told members of the press before a game. “I think it’s really important to protect children, and that’s little girls who are also involved in that category. I stand on what I said.”

But the uproar over the WNBA not expressly forbidding the inclusion of trans athletes is much ado about nothing. No transgender women have ever played in the league, which noted in a statement this month that there are also “no immediate eligibility matters” for it to address. League commissioner Cathy Engelbert has dismissed the anti-trans online vitriol and tiny protests outside stadiums as the work of “haters.”

To keep their non-controversy alive, then, culture warriors have been forced to get creative. As former NBA players Enes Kanter Freedom and Royce White, both cisgender men, fight to prove that identifying as women makes them eligible for the 2027 WNBA draft in April (it doesn’t), Watson and others in her orbit are seeding the lie that active players such as Griner are secretly transgender. It’s a development that validates years of warnings from activists that the right’s campaign to allegedly “save women’s sports” harms cisgender women as well as transgender athletes, leading to dangerous harassment across the board.

Another MAGA influencer with nearly 400,000 followers on X, for example, on Tuesday went far beyond demands that the WNBA bar trans players, calling for cheek swabs to determine the sex chromosomes of active players. That Tuesday post included a photo of Griner on the court. “Women’s sports exist because men and women are different,” the user wrote. “If the league is terrified of a cheek swab, that tells you everything you need to know.”

Meta has reached a proposed settlement worth up to approximately $18 billion with a bipartisan coalition of 52 attorneys generals over allegations that Facebook and Instagram were deliberately designed to encourage compulsive use by children and teenagers.

The settlement, which is awaiting court approval, resolves a lawsuit filed in 2023 by California Attorney General Rob Bonta and a bipartisan coalition of state attorneys general.

The lawsuit accused Meta of designing features that drove compulsive use among young users while misleading users, families, and the public about the risks of its platforms.

The attorneys general also alleged that Meta illegally collected and used data belonging to children under 13, violating federal and state laws, including the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), California’s False Advertising Law, and California’s Unfair Competition Law.

Under the agreement, Meta will introduce new restrictions for users under 18 on Facebook and Instagram, including a default two-hour daily usage limit that can only be turned off with parental permission. If YouTube and TikTok agree to similar terms, that limit would be reduced to one hour.

Meta will also block teens from using its apps between midnight and 6 a.m. by default and mute most notifications between 10 p.m. and 7 a.m. and during school hours, which a parent can modify. Direct messages and some account security or safety alerts are excluded from some of these restrictions.

Other requirements include hiding like and reaction counts from teenagers, blocking cosmetic surgery filters, providing an option for a non-personalized feed, strengthening parental supervision tools, and deploying additional age-verification technology to identify users under 18 and remove children under 13.

An independent auditor will also oversee Meta’s compliance with the agreement, while the company will be prohibited from making false or misleading claims about its safety features.

Meta says the agreement includes approximately $18 billion in payments over ten years. Participating states are set to receive roughly $12.7 billion.

Another $5.3 billion will only be released if YouTube and TikTok adopt similar changes, including one-hour daily limits, nighttime restrictions, and age-assurance measures, and each makes a matching payment.

“The agreement is designed to drive industry-wide adoption, ensuring teens receive consistent protections across the apps they use most, like YouTube and TikTok. If industry peers adopt this new standard, certain provisions will be strengthened,” announced Meta.

Of this money, California expected to receive between $1.5 billion and $2.1 billion.

“How a significant portion of the payment received by California will be spent will ultimately be decided by the Legislature and Governor, but in the proposed settlement it is earmarked for purposes related to the prevention or remediation of mental health or other harms to young Californians associated with social media use,” explains the press release by Attorney General Bonta.

Meta said it expects to incur approximately $10 billion in legal expenses related to the agreement in the third quarter of 2026

Most of the new protections must remain in place for ten years, and the agreement also establishes an independent research foundation focused on teen well-being and social media use.

Overall prevention scores can hide what happens after initial access. Once attackers are using valid credentials, prevention drops sharply.

The Blue Report 2026 measures defenses technique by technique across 338 million simulations run in customer production environments.

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Apple’s big AI push has reached the iPhone, iPad, and Mac, but a couple of noticeable devices are missing from the conversation. The Apple TV and HomePod have largely been left watching from the sidelines, despite Siri being such an important part of how you interact with both. That could finally change.

With iOS 27 getting closer to its public release, the latest beta appears to contain another clue that Apple is preparing to bring Apple Intelligence features to its living room devices. As spotted by Apple Home Authority, the Home app now includes a new menu called “Apple Intelligence Report” for compatible Apple TV and HomePod devices running beta software. On its own, a menu buried inside a beta might not sound particularly exciting. But considering neither the Apple TV nor HomePod currently supports Apple Intelligence, its appearance raises some interesting questions about what Apple has planned for later this year.

Siri could finally get smarter in your living room

The strongest possibility here is an upgraded version of Siri. Apple has been pushing toward a more consistent Siri experience across its ecosystem, which makes the current situation a little awkward. You could eventually have a much smarter assistant on your iPhone while asking the HomePod sitting a few feet away the same question and getting a far more limited response.

Bringing the newer Siri experience to the HomePod and Apple TV would help close that gap. On a HomePod, that could make everyday voice requests more useful, particularly when you don’t have another Apple device in your hand. The Apple TV could similarly benefit from a smarter assistant for finding something to watch, answering questions, or navigating content without forcing you to phrase every request carefully. There is an important catch, though. Simply installing iOS 27 on your iPhone isn’t enough to make the new Apple Intelligence Report appear. According to the discovery, the connected Apple TV or HomePod also needs to be running the tvOS 27 or HomePod 27 beta. That makes this look like more than an iPhone feature accidentally referencing other devices.

New hardware may be the missing piece

The bigger question is whether current Apple TV and HomePod models will actually get these AI features. Apple Intelligence has relatively demanding hardware requirements elsewhere in Apple’s lineup, so it wouldn’t be surprising if the company needed new chips inside its home devices before bringing its latest AI features over. Previous rumors have already pointed toward refreshed Apple TV 4K and HomePod hardware, making the timing of this new discovery particularly interesting.

Some existing devices may still receive at least part of the new functionality. The menu’s appearance doesn’t tell us which models will be supported, and Apple hasn’t officially announced Apple Intelligence support for either product yet. Fortunately, we may not have to wait much longer for answers. Apple is expected to hold its next major event on September 9, where it could finally explain why Apple TV and HomePod were so quiet during its earlier software announcements. If that happens, your iPhone might not be the only Apple device getting a much smarter Siri this fall; the little speaker in the corner of your room could finally be joining the AI party, too.

Apple TV just handed viewers a first look at its newest crime drama, and the pitch practically writes itself. Picture Grand Theft Auto colliding with Heat, then add two leads who can carry a screen on charisma alone. That’s 12 12 12, an eight-episode heist thriller starring and executive produced by Anthony Mackie and Jamie Dornan, set to premiere globally on November 13 with a two-episode debut. From there, new episodes drop every Friday until the finale lands on December 25.

What is 12 12 12 actually about?

The catchy title actually describes the show’s whole structure. Each episode moves across three timelines tied to one elaborate heist, covering the 12 months spent planning it, the 12 hours it takes to pull off, and the 12 days of fallout afterward.

Mackie plays a disgraced FBI agent squaring off against Dornan’s American career criminal, and their rivalry plays out as a tense game of cat and mouse across Europe. The endgame is a massive heist on a bank vault buried beneath the streets of Zurich.

The cast and crew behind Apple TV’s 12 12 12

The supporting cast brings real range, including Jack Kesy (Hellboy: The Crooked Man), Agathe Rousselle (Titane), Sallie Harmsen (Blade Runner 2049), José Garcia (Now You See Me), and Emmy nominee Kali Reis (True Detective).

Behind the camera, we have Emmy-nominated and BAFTA-winning filmmaker Kari Skogland directing multiple episodes, including the pilot, and also as an executive producer. She’s known for her work on The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, so expect a steady hand guiding the tone.

Series creators Dudi Appleton and Jim Keeble also serve as executive producers, with Paramount Television Studios and Anonymous Content producing. With that much talent stacked on both sides of the camera, 12 12 12 has high expectations to live up to.

Audio-Technica has expanded its StreamSet range with the ATH-M20xSTS.

The ATH-M20xSTS joins Audio-Technica’s StreamSet range as its second model and arrives after the ATH-M50xSTS established the line as a bridge between studio monitoring hardware and everyday streaming setups aimed at newer content creators.

That entry point suits streamers and creators new to dedicated audio gear and extends studio-grade monitoring technology into a lower price bracket than Audio-Technica’s professional line occupies. It builds on the ATH-M20x, a professional monitor headphone from the M-Series that has sold more than two million units, paired with microphone technology from the 20 Series.

Inside the ATH-M20xSTS, 40mm CCAW voice coil drivers deliver a wide bandwidth and flat frequency response, specifications that allow users to monitor original game audio accurately rather than through a coloured or bass-heavy tuning.

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The headset weighs approximately 230g and uses breathable mesh earpads alongside elliptical earcups designed for extra noise isolation, a combination that helps keep it comfortable through long recording or gaming sessions lasting several hours at a time.

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An integrated AT20 cardioid condenser microphone sits on a flexible boom arm that keeps it close to the mouth during movement, and flipping the arm upward mutes the microphone instantly for quick control during a live stream.

Connectivity runs through a detachable cable fitted with a 3.5mm TRRS mini-plug, alongside USB Type-A and USB Type-C adapters that extend plug-and-play compatibility across PCs, consoles and mobile devices without additional software or drivers required for setup.

The ATH-M20xSTS is available now from Audio-Technica site, with general sale following from 1 September at €99 / £89.

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